with Micropumpto Control Drug Delivery

By Lexie Metzler, Associate Editor,
Medical Design Technology

Switzerland-based company Sensirion developed a micro- fluidic drug delivery device that
combines a miniature sensor and
micropump. In this exclusive interview
with Medical Design Technology,
design engineers from Sensirion share
some of the details of their design and
its implications on future drug delivery
products.

1. Please tell us a little about the device,and why you created it.

The joint project focused on the development of an integrated, single-use
module for a controlled and monitored
drug delivery. The objective of the project
was to demonstrate the possibilities of
such a solution for single-use, low flow
applications to the medical technology
industry. The highest level of integration
has not even been reached yet.

The micropump would deliver the
drug through the liquid flow sensor to
the patient in a controlled way. The
intelligence added by the sensor allows
for failure mode detection, e.g., occlusion, air-in-line, free flow, or others. The
collected data can be made available to
patients and doctors at the same time,
allowing for a faster, more direct, and
personalized therapy.

From our point of view, such an integrated drug delivery module opens up
entirely new possibilities for single-use
home care, wearable, or life science
applications that will simplify patient
compliance in the future.

Thinking about integrating a liquid
flow sensor into a fluidic system early on
in the design cycle has several advantages. In addition to improving the system’s
accuracy and response time, the redundancy it introduces enables independent
measurements which enhance its overall
safety. For example, the flow sensor
could also be used to detect degradation
of the pumping mechanism or a valve,
and possibly other failure modes as well.

For these reasons, we believe that the
LD20 sensor platform has great potential for a wide range of use cases.

The LD20 single-use liquid flow
sensor used for this concept study is
compact and measures flow rates in the
micro and millimeter per hour range.

The sensor is an electronic component
and measures the liquid flow by a thermal measurement principle. A heating
element on the microchip applies a
minimal amount of heat to the medium
for thermal flow measurement. Two